Tech Sightings, August 6, 2014

A non-profit group based at Rice University is developing a new approach to learning. In the next two years, OpenStax will produce personalized interactive books that better match individual learning aptitudes.

Bertolt Meyer, who was born without a lower left arm, started wearing prosthetics when he was only three months old. Now equipped with a high-tech bionic arm, Meyer talks about how technology is changing perceptions of disability.

More than 1,200 people surveyed through online gaming forums say they experienced hallucination-like thoughts and behaviors after gaming. Psychology researchers who conducted the study found that 12% of the group reported hearing imaginary sounds after playing video games.

Hold Security, a Milwaukee firm, has discovered that a Russian crime ring has amassed a horde of stolen Internet credentials that include up to 1.2 billion user name and password combinations and more than 500 million email addresses.

According to officials who asked not to be identified, Beijing has excluded Apple’s iPads and MacBook laptops from products that can be bought with public money due to security concerns. The iPad, iPad Mini, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are all on the final government procurement list that was distributed in July.

In an ongoing anti-trust probe involving Western technology firms, China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce revisited the offices of Microsoft and its partner Accenture PLC in Beijing, Liaoning, Fujian and Hubei. Officials say Microsoft has been suspected of violating China’s anti-monopoly law since last year.

Aida Akl is a journalist working on VOA's English Webdesk. She has written on a wide range of topics, although her more recent contributions have focused on technology. She has covered both domestic and international events since the mid-1980s as a VOA reporter and international broadcaster.

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Whether you are in a big city or a small village – technology is in your hands, your pocket, your car, your home. It is everywhere. And everywhere, it is becoming us.

Techtonics looks at how technology intersects people’s lives, how it empowers them or traps them in a world increasingly obsessed with technological wonders even as privacy slips through its fingers. It aims to inform, discuss, and hopefully inspire.